


cross the threshold have no dread

by parishilton



Series: exit [1]
Category: South Park
Genre: M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Virgin Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2018-06-30
Packaged: 2018-10-04 04:26:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10268216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parishilton/pseuds/parishilton
Summary: “so, my friend’s ghost is either a pissed-off native american, or it’s some little ghost kitty reenacting pet sematary?” kenny asks, jerking his thumb in craig’s direction with a slight smirk on his face that will probably go undetected by mephesto, who seems to be taking this as serious as a heart attack.or, craig is being haunted. craig contacts the spirits. the spirits want to use craig as a virgin sacrifice.





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

> title from "here is little effie's head" by ee cummings.

the only time craig truly has to himself anymore is when he’s doing laundry, therefore, laundry has become therapeutic to him. he likes to sneak off to the private laundry room around midnight, after his mom and ruby are asleep. he takes his sweet time separating colors, setting his motivational cleaning playlist to the right song, and taking selfies in front of the clothesline packed with dripping-wet bras to send to token and clyde. one of his new neighbors is a broad-chested seventy-year-old widower who lives with two siamese cats. she likes to leave her intimates hanging on full display every week. clyde says she must be trying to attract a new husband. token says she’s probably going senile. craig says she just doesn’t give a fuck, which he can relate to.  

craig is in the midst of spraying stain remover on the sweat stains formed under the arms of his _star wars_ tee shirt he’d worn during track practice earlier that week when he hears footsteps approaching. he quickly drops the cigarette he was smoking onto the tile floor and stubs it out with his slipper, assuming it was the landlord coming in to berate him for smoking indoors again. “jesus, not again,” craig mutters under his breath when he sees who it _actually_ is.

the door swings open and someone comes barreling through with a armful of dirty clothes, a pair of jeans falling in a heap to the floor. “lost another fucking sock by the side of the road,” kenny complains, chewing on a toothpick. craig resists the urge to call him _huckleberry finn_.

“maybe if you'd put them in a rolling hamper, or at least your fucking backpack….” craig grits out. he hates it when kenny uses the apartment building's private laundry room.

“speaking of _fucking_ ,” kenny begins, toothpick bobbing up and down all the while, “ruby told karen that the _real_ reason you guys moved here was because of an _ashley madison_ scandal. you know, now that i’ve been promoted to assistant manager of city wok, i’ve been thinking of finding myself a sugar baby. so, what do you say, tucker? does a taste for tasteless affairs run in the family?”

it’s hard for craig to believe it’s already been a month since the whole town had found out thomas tucker had cheated on his wife and then been kicked out of the house by her. although trolltrace had only been up and running for a few short hours, it had managed to do an irreparable amount of damage to many families in south park. craig’s parents had ended up having to split up the money from selling the house to both afford separate apartments, and craig and ruby had both decided to live with their mother, to show their loyalty.

although kenny was getting more hours and probably had received a very small pay raise, craig couldn't imagine being kenny mccormick's sugar baby would grant you much in the department of free gifts besides free city beef and free city pork. not exactly on par with what gifts craig thought were usually given to sugar babies - stacks of cash, louis vuitton handbags, and new macbooks, all of which were just not possible for kenny to _actually_ dish out when craig suspected most of kenny's salary was going to help his parent's pay their bills and to send karen to that new vocational high school. 

that's also disregarding the fact that if craig were to accept such a tragic proposal, he would have to be truly demented. as unfairly attractive as kenny was, craig preferred to keep his dignity intact over getting laid, probably only once, because kenny may as fucking well have adhd when it comes to sex. _addicted to dicking humans in droves_ , that is. craig's not interested in being dicked down by kenny mccormick, then forced to wait in awkward silence by the bus stop with him for the rest of senior year, so kenny has nothing to offer him other than his unselective, and therefore dishonorable, dick. craig scowls. “you couldn’t afford me if mr. kim promoted you to _king_ of shi tpa town," he says snottily, choosing smartly to pin his disinterest on kenny because of his lack of funds, rather than craig's extreme fussiness. 

“challenge received and accepted.” kenny winks. “something about a prude holding a spray bottle is just so sexy to me. hit me with that water, baby, i’ve been a naughty boy!” kenny says without a shred of sincerity.

craig ignores him entirely and goes back to his cycle of laundry. it’s not until he hears boots being kicked off that he looks back, only to see kenny in the midst of undoing his belt and toeing off his shoes. “what the fuck are you doing, mccormick?”

“adding these jeans to the washer,” kenny says offhandedly, “plus my apron. some fucking yelper was too busy rating us zero stars to pay attention to the fucking scalding hot tea in his hand. burnt the fucking shit out of my legs.”

craig looks in distress down to the apron kenny is already untying and discarding onto the floor. kenny is left standing in front of him wearing only a pair of white calvin klein underwear that he must have either stolen or passed up on pop-tarts for the week by buying, and a white wife beater. craig tries to keep his eyes off kenny’s package. he grumbles in frustration, turning his back to kenny. of course his only downtime all week would be ruined by kenny-fucking-mccormick.

after craig sets the timer to thirty minutes, he pulls out his phone to have something to do with his hands. all the girls craig followed on twitter from school were always talking about how hot cole sprouse was, but kenny made cole sprouse look like a fucking troll. with kenny’s freckles and full pillowy lips, his tan fucking skin from spending every afternoon in the sun, swinging a stolen golf club from the local walmart into his dad’s empty beer cans that littered the front lawn, trying to hit passing cars, he always looked effortlessly handsome, like a young river phoenix, though craig would never admit it.

kenny was always riffling through his hair like he was digging for spare change under a couch cushion, mussing it up into an angelic white halo. when kenny’s sister first began classes at a vocational school for hairdressing, she had bleached his hair, but his roots were starting to come back in dirty blonde. cartman gave kenny shit about his hair every day now and almost exclusively referred to him now as  _slim shady_. craig thought kenny looked almost too good to be real.

for all kenny’s whining and moaning about not wanting to get stuck in south park for the rest of his life, craig thinks he should probably stop sleeping with every girl that blinks at him. for kenny, it could almost be a curse to look that good. every girl he sleeps with would probably love to trap the handsome son of a bitch into holy matrimony by means of an accidental pregnancy. kenny could fuck sarah jessica parker and still have kids that would probably blind the fucking sun with how pretty they were.

“tucker,” kenny calls, “that growth spurt of your’s isn’t gonna keep me from reaching up there and decking you if you keep glaring at me.”

craig isn’t about to admit he was admiring kenny and not actually glaring, so he snorts and flicks his cigarette idly. “my little sister has a step-stool in her room if you want to try.”

“ _or ,_ ” kenny begins, “i kick you in the nuts, you go down, and i start swinging.”

“if you kick me in the nuts, i’ll bite.”

kenny smirks, probing the inside of his cheek with his tongue as he mulls this over. eyes scanning craig up and down, he says, “is that a threat or a promise?”

“i think all that bleach went to your head," craig snides.

“sorry,” kenny says, “i tuned you out, but all i heard was something about you giving me head?”

craig tries to hide his nerves by lowering his head and taking a puff from his cigarette. “you wish,” he replies lamely.

“yes,” kenny grins, biting on his toothpick again. “yes, i do.” 

* * *

standing at the bus stop with kenny, craig grins and stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jacket. kenny pulls a can of aerosol hairspray out of his backpack, looks both ways to make sure nobody is watching him besides craig, and crouches behind a conveniently-placed sign advertising for the new _whole foods_ market. the irony of using empty aerosol cans to hit o-zone-friendly hybrid cars is not lost on craig.

kenny’s thighs spread indecently wide across the sidewalk, his knee knocking into craig’s shin, while he aims in preparation for his next target. a brand new, shiny hybrid prius comes to a halt at the stop sign just as an empty can of aerosol hairspray shoots out from under the sign, the only visible part of kenny being his ratty old work boots. it bounces off the driver’s side door, only chipping the black paint in a spot as small as a pinhole.

“hey! knock it off, you fucking kids!” the owner shouts through the crack in his window, then speeds away.

kenny springs up like a corkscrew, laughing maddeningly. “penis tap prius, no penis taps back.” he slaps craig in the groin, enough to send craig doubling over, but not enough for craig to bother trying to stifle a small laugh.

“don’t tell me this won’t be the highlight of the rest of your boring-ass day, tucker,” kenny says, voice smarmy and eyes bright. “i bet the highlight of your day yesterday was seeing me in my calvins.”

“kendall jenner has nothing on you, mccormick,” craig says in a monotone, “and that was definitely a highlight over what happened after that.”

kenny frowns, patting the top of craig’s head patronizingly, as if he were a dog. “what happened? someone on reddit tell you that your _star wars_ fan art was bad?”

“i think my place is haunted,” craig says simply, twisting his fingers around the strings of his chulo hat to calm the nerves he always gets when he tries to confide in something with kenny that nobody else knows.

kenny looks at him apprehensively. “who would want to haunt your boring ass? carrie fisher? maybe she’s mad you drew her hair buns like a set of hairy balls.”

“my window kept opening and closing on it’s own. i lock it every night.”

“are you locking your window every night to keep me out?” kenny asks, placing his hand on his heart. “that hurts, craig.”

“can i crash at your’s tonight?” craig asks softly, kicking the toe of his sneaker into a rock and sending it flying into the road.

kenny throws his arm gently around craig’s shoulders, looking at him sidelong, mouth pressed into a firm line. “you don’t want that. my parents would keep you up all night screaming.” he stares at craig intently, trying to read an expression on craig’s face that just isn’t there. “are you serious? you really think your apartment is haunted?” for once, kenny sounds worried about him. “i mean, this _is_ south park. i guess anything is possible.”

“yeah.” craig hates to verbalize more of his feelings than he absolutely has to, especially if he feels like he’s essentially begging for help like a baby.

“alright,” kenny says, “i’ll stay at your’s.”

kenny has never stayed at craig’s, not before he moved, and not since then. craig swallows hard, hoping kenny knows this isn’t some ploy to get kenny to hook up with him.

when the bus finally pulls up to their stop, the door swinging open always on the wrong side of the street, kenny keeps his arm firmly around craig’s shoulders, leading him to cross the street as if he were a helpless elderly woman. when they board the bus, craig goes to sit by clyde and kenny goes to sit by butters.

craig looks across the aisle to the seat across from his and clyde’s. all he can see is kyle’s back turned to him, his mass of curly orange hair, and his green-mittened hands pulling and prodding at stan’s face, which is sporting one truly horrendous black eye. his eye looks nearly swollen shut. craig thinks if someone had beat _his_ face to a pulp, the last thing he would want would be clyde tugging his face around. then again, craig’s not in love with clyde.

kenny is always telling craig how alike he and stan look, but craig scoffs every time. their physical similarities start and end with their black hair, and even their hair looks nothing alike anymore. stan has a mop of shiny and voluminous hair, like the top of a newfoundland’s head, that fell in front of his eyes constantly, and craig has an undercut, head shaved everywhere but at the top of his head, where the hair was slicked back and greasy with hair gel that ruby had bought off of karen mccormick.

craig watches with raised eyebrows as stan’s good eye flutters shut when kyle tips stan’s head back again, one mitten holding stan steady by his chin. craig strains to hear their low voices. all he can make out is kyle angrily spitting out the words “ _fucking_ _shelley!_ ” and stan yelping out “ _kyle!_ ”, sounding completely humiliated. what a fucking pussy stan was. he may as well ask kyle to protect him from shelley, considering he was too chickenshit to do anything about it himself.

from beside craig, clyde is snoring, his forehead pressed against the window of the school bus as he slept. craig sighs heavily. he could hear butters and kenny laughing and joking behind him. it pained craig to even admit to himself how fucking lonely he was sometimes. the other day after school, he was so desperate for company, he’d actually sat in ruby’s bathroom on her stool, watching her talk on speakerphone to karen while she curled her hair, that is, until she flipped him off and told him to go somewhere else.  

truth is, he could call stan marsh a pussy all he wanted, but at the end of the day, stan probably never got lonely. he had kyle, who adored stan so much he probably thought stan’s zits were cute, kenny, who hovered around the two of them like he was a paid bodyguard, and even cartman, who tolerated stan more than any other dickhead at their school.

all craig has is his elderly, decrepit guinea pig, his extensive movie collection, and clyde, who has been harboring an unrequited crush on token since they were kids. craig hates himself for inviting kenny over, where he'll have to fend off kenny's advances all night. kenny is the only goddamn person who pays craig any attention at all, though craig’s flat-face and apathetic appearance in every social situation he’d been in since beginning in south park elementary probably didn’t help that cause, not that being aware of that made him want to make an effort, anyway. 

* * *

“you’re a hot commodity, you know that, tucker? if your ass was a luxury condo and i was your real estate agent, we’d have a bidding war on our hands.” kenny’s eyes remain locked on his red cigarette lighter, which he lights the flame to and lets it die out repeatedly, only to flick it back on again.

craig heaves a pained sigh. “is this some weird method for you and butters to try to recruit me to be a prostitute? i thought butters stopped being a pimp after the fourth grade.”

“he did,” kenny laughs, looking fond at the mention of the memory, “but i wouldn’t say no to kissing you behind the school for five bucks.” he winks.

“aw, don’t take out a second mortgage on your house just for _me_.”

kenny punches him lightly in the arm. “fuck you, dickhead. no, you just wouldn’t _believe_ the shit people say about you.” he pauses, clears his throat, and begins speaking in a girly, high-pitched tone. _“craig is_ so _hot. like, he just doesn’t give a fuck!”_

craig wrinkles his nose. “who said that?”

kenny shrugs. “does it matter?”

 _not unless it was you_ , craig thinks. “nope,” he says.

“that’s what i thought,” kenny smirks. “of course you’re not interested. you’re such a prude, tucker. i don’t know why every girl in school thinks you’re some kind of badass sex god. they clearly have the two of us confused.”

craig glares at him. “shut the fuck up, mccormick. my mom is home.”

kenny takes one look at craig’s open bedroom door and grins. “shouldn’t the open door policy only apply when you have girls over?”

craig looks at him blankly. why would he have girls over?

“oh, right. you see, girls are kinda like guys, except for the queefing. you would have probably seen one or two at school before, if you’d have ever spared a glance away from my chiseled, rugged body.”

kenny’s body is anything but chiseled and rugged, craig thinks, trying not to visibly check him out. he is probably still a good two or three inches shorter than craig. plus, his arms were skinnier than most of the girls in their grade, his wrists as dainty as one’s too, craig notices as he watches kenny fiddle absentmindedly with his lighter. yet, kenny’s foolhardy and reckless behavior, coupled with his over-exaggerated flirtation definitely didn’t make anyone think of him as if he were a girl. if anything, the slightly feminine quality to the dip of his cupid's bow and his almost delicate wrists make girls go even crazier for him. he always looks one hug away from snapping in two, like he needs to be nursed to health, and girls love that shit. it doesn't exactly repel craig, either. 

craig considers kenny to be one of the most hyper-masculine guys he's ever met, body non-withstanding, on account of his abhorrently wanton personality and need to steer every conversation he has back to sex. despite having every reason on earth to find kenny unbearable to be around, craig finds himself longing for kenny when he's not around, simply because he misses the attention, but kenny teasing him about girls, when he knows fully-well that craig is attracted to him, is more than irritating. so, maybe it’d been a few years since he had so much as kissed a girl. or anyone, for that matter, as if he really needed reminding. glaring, craig retorts, “i _know_ what a girl is, asswipe. you’re one to talk about it, when stan marsh and kyle broflovski are your best friends.” 

“hey, they at least _talk_ to girls at school. you sit alone, not talking to anybody, with a blank expression on your face, while a seven hour loop of _animals close-up with a wide-angle lens_ plays in your head.”

craig scoffs. “that’s not what i’m thinking about.”

“whatever it is that you think about, then. _star wars_ , hamsters, my devilishly good looks….”

“stripe is a _guinea pig_ ,” craig corrects, nose in the air. his eyes flick over to where stripe’s cage is, sitting atop his computer desk.

kenny picks up craig’s remote from his bedside table and turns his television on, flipping through the channels idly. “so, what ever happened to _animals close-up with a wide-angle lens_?”

“blew our budget for the show on cough medicine and little hats for the dogs, couldn’t afford to pay the station for our time slot.”

kenny throws his arm around craig, shoving up close to him in bed. “but it was so... _cuteeee_ !” he gushes, poking craig in the rib. “ _super cute_!”

craig knows kenny isn’t referring to him, but he feels his face heat up nonetheless. he elbows kenny lightly in the rib to throw him off. he doesn’t need kenny thinking that feeling craig up in his bed is going to become a _thing_.

“hey, do me a favor tomorrow, will you?” kenny asks, “since i’m so generously doing you one tonight.”

“i’m not doing your laundry again,” craig gripes, “you’re a dipshit for leaving a five dollar bill in your jeans.” if craig could get away with slapping kenny upside the head for blaming him for his torn-up money that had gone through the wash, without kenny retaliating, he would be so happy.

“guess that’s why they call it money-laundering,” kenny surmises with a chuckle before continuing, “i was _going_ to say, can you turn nascar on tomorrow so i can watch from my house, but throw in a load of my laundry too, and my bedside manner tonight will include something naughty.”

craig snorts. “that’d be a great incentive if i were trying to collect venereal diseases like marsh collects black eyes from his sister.”

“ooh, stop trying to turn me on, tucker!” kenny reaches over and pinches craig’s thigh from over his jeans. “stop reminding me of how pure and virginal you are! you know that’s my type!”

craig wrinkles his eyebrows. “since when is that your type? i would hardly call the girls who give you blowjobs from behind a tree near stark’s pond _pure_ or _virginal_.”

“jealous?” kenny asks, smacking a kiss on craig’s cheek. “just so you know, the way to my heart and beating all the hussies is putting nascar on tomorrow for me.” he wiggles his eyebrows at craig, while craig looks at him, unimpressed. “c’mon tucker, you know you give me a dale earnhardt-on.” he watches as craig bites the inside of his own cheek, trying not to laugh. then, craig feels kenny’s hands jostling him around by his chest playfully. “just let me danica patyourdick!”

“you’re so disgusting,” craig says between laughs and wheezes as he lets kenny manhandle him, still vainly trying to pretend to be disinterested in all physical contact with kenny, though he thinks kenny must be slowly starting to realize craig is attracted to him, despite probably not expecting that craig would ever give it up to _him_ of all people, when craig was still a virgin, as kenny was right to think. craig would sooner cut off his own dick than let himself become another notch on kenny mccormick’s admittedly collapsing bedpost.

nobody knows craig is actually a closeted romantic, in addition to being a closeted virgin, and closeted in general, so it's not his own reputation he would be concerned about if he were to sleep with kenny. craig doesn't give a fuck what people think about him, except if what they're thinking is _craig is a total sap and wants kenny to be his boyfriend._  kenny seemingly doesn’t have the ability to love any of his conquests, though he’s never breathed a bad word about any of them, no matter how shallow or inconsequential the experience. that hardly offers any comfort to craig. he'd much rather kenny date him and tell people that craig was a neurotic headcase than fuck him once and tell people that craig was a nice guy. 

* * *

sometime after craig dozes off, laying on his stomach with his face mashed into one of his pillows, while the background hum of some action movie comes from the television, kenny still awake and watching, is when the weird things start happening again. the television goes to static and it’s kenny’s rustling around, shoving the blankets off his legs to get up and go check on the wiring, that wakes him up.

“why aren’t you asleep?” craig asks, voice hoarse and throat dry from sleep.

kenny turns to look at him like he’s stupid, while kneeling on the floor beside the television. “you asked me here to keep an eye out for you.”

“i guess i expected you to spend all night trying to grope me and then give up and fall asleep,” craig admits.

“you’re a real dickhead!” kenny exclaims. “i might be a shameless flirt, but i’m no bad-fucking-friend and i wouldn’t promise to help you and then not do it!”

“we aren’t friends!” craig clarifies, sitting up in his bed. “you’ve just desensitized me by grabbing my dick so much that i forget that!”

kenny stands up, forgetting about the staticky television altogether. “fuck you, tucker! i’m your _only_ friend and you’re damn lucky to have me!”

it’s then that craig realizes his television has shut off. darkness floods the room as the only source of light has gone out and craig can’t even see the hand in front of his face, let alone kenny. “did you turn the tv off?”  he asks hoarsely.

“fuck no,” kenny replies and stumbles around in the dark, knocking his hip into craig’s bedside table and rattling craig's alarm clock and empty soda cans, before rejoining him in bed. “scoot over, tucker.” craig’s body complies before his brain can even remind him that he’s still pissed off at kenny, who’s bare legs are now pressed against craig’s under the covers. “if any beasties come for us, i’ll use your body as a shield,” kenny says.

“yeah, you’d like to use my body, alright,” craig mutters to himself, pulling the blankets back over to his side, so kenny can’t hog them.

before kenny can form a response, the television turns back on from the other side of the room. craig looks over and sees kenny’s face illuminated in the soft light, his eyebrows knitted in confusion. but that’s not all he sees. stripe’s cage is suspended mid-air, levitating two feet above craig’s computer desk.

kenny is back out of bed, with his hands on either side of the cage, standing in the middle of the room, eyeing craig nervously, when craig’s once open bedroom door, by his mother’s request, slams shut. “well,” kenny says, voice thick with nerves, still holding stripe’s cage, “it’s safe to say that the ghosts who are haunting you really want you to get laid, tucker.”

* * *

turning to his group of overzealous, incompetent assholes, kenny holds up a brown paper bag, which clinks as he raises it high into the air. “i brought something to get us into the _spirit_ of the ouija.” he pulls out a bottle of vodka. craig groans from beside kenny. these fucking idiots didn’t _need_ any alcohol to get any stupider. he could see it now: cartman drunkenly trying to ‘exterminate’ ruby’s chinpokomon, which had been handed down from craig, kenny drunkenly trying to dye butters’ hair neon pink with some of karen’s _manic panic_ dye, and stan and kyle drunkenly playing spin the bottle alone, with kenny’s bottle of vodka. no fucking thank you.

“oh, boy,” butters says, pressing his knuckles together. “i don’t think i get the joke.”

“it’s a _spirit_ , get it?” kenny explains, holding up the bottle once more.

craig groans. fucking idiots.

“ken, do you really think this is a good idea?” kyle asks kenny quietly, leaning in with one hand resting gently on kenny’s shoulder. “don’t you remember that rumor that circulated once about the goth kids summoning edgar allen poe? they said it _worked_.”

kenny gives kyle a look of disbelief. “you’re the biggest skeptic i know. you don’t _actually_ believe that, do you?” when kyle says nothing, kenny continues. “don’t you think it’d be more realistic if they’d managed to summon some _random_ dead guy, not their own personal hero? that would be like if you told me you just so _happened_ to summon _moses_ on the first try. kind of convenient, don’t you think?”

stan nods before swigging back the bottle of vodka. “yeah, kyle. lighten up.”

as soon as stan walks off, kyle turns to kenny and gives him a meaningful look. “oh, great. now we have to deal with craig’s loser ghosts _and_ randy two-point-oh.”

kenny snickers. “he’ll be fine. half that bottle is water.” he winks at kyle, while kyle looks on after kenny in astounded relief. “the rest is in a water bottle in craig’s fridge.”

“you’re a lifesaver, ken.” kyle, who’s significantly shorter than kenny, reaches up and wraps his arms around kenny’s neck. “i owe you.”

“you don’t owe me shit, broflovski,” kenny murmurs softly into kyle’s ear, while gently rubbing his back. craig almost doesn’t even catch the words, they’re spoken so low. he turns to look over to where all the noise is coming from on the other side of the room. marsh is currently in a headlock by cartman, though he’s staring at kyle even while his neck is in a sleeper hold. if that’s not dedication to being a fucking creep, craig doesn’t know what is. fucking pussy. god, he hates all of these guys, craig thinks as he looks back to kenny.

“why are they here?” craig asks through gritted teeth. he really couldn’t stand these guys, especially marsh, not since peru. he didn’t care if people didn’t want to hang around him because he would hold a lifelong grudge if you so much as looked at him wrong - if anything, the fact that it kept people like marsh away from craig made him happy.

“you’re supposed to use a ouija in a _large_ group,” kenny explains, “ _never_ alone. the more people present, the less chance any evil forces have of overpowering you. technically, you’re not supposed to use one in your own home either, in case of a violent history with past owners, but since these apartments were just built last month...” he trails off, shrugging, as if to say _‘what’s the worst that could happen?’_

despite distinctly remembering kenny’s idiot friends saying something similar to craig before convincing him to start a pan-flute band with them, craig wrinkles his nose in agreement. “fine, but if we accidentally summon satan himself, marsh is the first person i’m throwing his way.”

kenny grins and wraps his arm around craig's shoulders. “duly noted.”

* * *

“stan,” cartman begins sweetly, “are your hands always this fucking sweaty, or is kahl’s arm touching your dick making you nervous?”

craig snickers. it’s definitely not a lie. stan’s hand, on top of everyone else’s on the planchette, which hasn’t moved in the twenty minutes they’ve been sitting around the board, is clammy with sweat. though they're all huddled closely around the board, craig hasn't draped himself over anyone's lap, mostly because he can't stand ninety percent of the people in this room.

out of the corner of his eye, craig sees kyle pulling his arm away from stan. “actually, i think stan’s nervous that if a ghost possesses cartman's body and he jumps on us, he'll kill us all with his fat fucking ass,” kyle supplies.

“aye!” cartman yelps. “let him speak for himself, you filthy jew!”

kyle, with clenched fists from arguing with cartman, and cartman, with a neutral expression, both turn to look at stan at the same time. stan, who’s still not drunk, despite knocking back half the bottle of watered-down vodka himself, looks like a bear cub with it’s foot caught in a hunting trap. “oh, um. i was actually just worried that butters was going to piss himself.”

craig turns to look at butters, who indeed looks like he’s about to be sick, staring at the ouija board plaintively. “it’s alright, fellas,” butters promises. “i promise i won’t -ah- piss myself.”

craig groans once more. fucking pussies. from under his hand, craig feels something twitch lightly. “mccormick, knock it off,” he says.

“i’m not doing anything,” kenny mutters, his eyes dark and strikingly beautiful when he meets craig’s. he licks his lips, looking nervous. “shit, i think it’s working.”

everyone quiets down as the planchette finally slides from the word ‘hello’ down to the alphabet. it seems to hover for several long seconds over the alphabet before finally sliding down to the letter _‘v’_.

“the letter _‘v’_ mean anything to you, tucker?” kenny asks quietly.

“no,” craig answers honestly. “maybe they’re going to spell their own name.”

everyone seems to look back intently to the board. stan’s hands, if even possible, seem clammier than before, though that might be because kyle’s free hand is gripping stan’s knee so hard his knuckles have gone bone-white. the planchette moves to the letter _‘i’_.

“victor maybe?” kenny mutters. “victoria?”

the next letters becomes _‘r’_ , then, _‘g’_ , and then _‘i’_ again. craig begins to get very confused because, well, it’s certainly starting to become obvious what the board is about to spell out for them. when the planchette finally hits the _‘n’_ , craig can feel his face burning.

kenny clears his throat. “is anybody here still a virgin?” he asks lightly, without looking up, like he doesn’t want to offend any of them. craig can't imagine that kenny doesn't know he’s a virgin, if not because he hasn't had a girlfriend for all of high school, then because his whole body has gone rigid. 

cartman seems ecstatic to take this opportunity to announce that he’s not a virgin. “i’ve boned so many girls in our grade, my nickname should be _skeletor_.”

kyle scoffs. “you’ve boned _heidi_ and that’s only because her parents split up after her dad saw on trolltrace that her mom had been cheating on him! you preyed on an innocent girl’s vulnerabilities!” craig sighs deeply. he can relate.

“kahl, you’ve been preying on stan’s vulnerabilities all damn night! he’s drunk and you've still been up his ass like a bad wedgie!" kyle uses his free hand to punch cartman hard in the shoulder, and cartman responds by screaming out in over-exaggerated pain.

“butters, what about you?” stan asks, ignoring the both of them.

butters looks over to kenny briefly and winces. “well, no. i -ah- i’m not a virgin.”

craig feels his chest tighten uncomfortably. kenny was deflowering so many fucking kids in their school, he may as well call himself a weed-whacker. if craig hadn’t _already_ denounced the idea of sleeping with kenny, he would have chosen to denounce it now. like he wanted kenny’s dick to be anywhere _near_ craig when it had already been inside _butters_ of all fucking people. “broflovski?” craig asks, through gritted teeth, because like-hell does he want to speak directly to marsh.

kyle shakes his head. “no, um, one of token’s parties…” he trails off, but seems sincere. although craig hates to admit it, he believes him. “stan?” kyle asks, pursing his lips.

stan looks at kyle for a long moment while chewing on his lip before muttering out a feeble, “yeah, same. one of token’s other parties.” he takes another swig from the bottle of vodka.

kenny clears his throat delicately once more. “craig?”

craig can feel kenny’s, butters’, cartman’s, kyle’s, and stan’s eyes on him simultaneously. fuck if this isn’t one of the most humiliating moments of his entire life. he shouldn’t even give a fuck what any of these guys think of him, since he’s hated them since the third grade and all, yet he finds he _does_ for some bizarre reason. call it the male ego or call it craig’s unfortunate attraction to kenny that’s seemingly not going anywhere, try as craig might to make it disappear, but craig _does_ care what they think of him.  

“let’s try asking what the spirit’s name is,” kenny declares, thankfully not forcing craig to admit his lack of manhood to his group of jackass friends.

the planchette begins to rocket across the board with a mind of it’s own. kyle scribbles down each letter onto a scrap paper on his knee, while his other hand remains on the planchette, right below stan’s. when the planchette finally stills, it’s gone through eight letters in the alphabet. kyle throws the scrap paper down onto the table. it reads _mephesto_.

cartman snorts loudly. “that retard who made the four-assed monkey? does he think if he can somehow give craig four asses from beyond the grave, craig might actually get laid? craig better hope mephesto doesn't try that around kenny. he might ask mephesto to grow him four dicks.”


	2. two

craig wakes up after a fitful night of sleep, having been awoken from bed nearly five times by his bedroom door opening and shutting by itself, and his underwear drawer having spit out several pairs, which were now strewn across his floor. as somebody with strong convictions about tidiness, craig really wishes his ghost were more of a considerate roommate. he rolls to the other side of his bed to face his window, only to discover the curtains have been pulled back by themselves too. he grunts as he rolls out of bed and walks over to the curtains in only his boxers and an _evil dead_ tee shirt.

the windows are floor-to-ceiling, designed that way specifically to let in the maximum amount of light. craig also has a strong conviction about morning people - namely that they can’t be trusted. anybody who enjoys being blinded by light first thing in the morning isn’t a sane or rational person, and craig has enough irrational people to deal with from within his own home to start worrying about the inanimate objects in his apartment being out to get him too.

 

craig groans sleepily and presses his forehead against his window, closing his eyes. he thinks if he tries hard enough, he may be able to fall back asleep standing up. he wishes he could ditch school and just sleep all day. nothing paranormal has ever happened to craig in the daytime. maybe the ghost floats over to his mother’s room and empties out all of her drawers while she’s at work. at least having to clean her room every day would explain how she never has time for craig when she gets home.

of course, that’s just craig trying to find humor in a humorless situation. his mom has yet to realize, despite hundreds of times craig’s door has opened and closed at night for the past week, that he’s being haunted. maybe she just thinks his bladder is becoming weak in his old age and that he needs to piss approximately thirty times a night. she has always called him an old soul.

craig opens his eyes reluctantly after a minute and looks straight ahead, only to see kenny standing at his own bedroom window, just across the street. craig pulls his face back quickly, frowning. kenny’s bare-chested and, if craig looks closely enough, appears to be completely naked. his sharp hip-bones jut out menacingly, but move out of view as kenny walks closer to his bedroom window and presses his lips to the glass, giving it a kiss. craig’s stomach flips, so he stumbles backwards, clumsily trying to tug his blackout curtains shut. there’s a rough knock to craig’s door frame and craig turns around quickly.

“hey, dick-for-brains,” ruby addresses him with a smirk, “you’re driving me to school today with mom’s car.” she leans against craig’s bedroom door frame, her pigtails frizzy and coming undone from sleeping in them. her pink pajama pants have strawberries on them and her black shirt features ghostface from _scream_. another tucker conundrum. craig looks like an expressionless hard-ass, but he’s actually insecure and just really good at putting up walls. ruby looks like an innocent girly-girl, but she’s stubborn as balls and willing to go toe-to-toe with people double her age.

“no, i’m not,” craig says calmly and nasally, walking over to his dresser and going through his meticulously-folded band tee shirts.

ruby comes up and punches him in the arm, her little fist connecting with the muscle _hard_. when he thinks of ruby’s outward appearance and how it contradicts with the demon inside, it makes him think of how people always assume pit-bulls are evil beasts and chihuahuas are docile little angels, when in reality, most pit-bulls are docile, and most chihuahuas have a napoleon complex, growl, bite, and just generally deal damage for the sheer enjoyment of it.

“evil bitch,” craig says flatly, rubbing his tender skin.

ruby rolls her eyes. “mom’s on the phone with gerald broflovski again and says she can’t drive me to school. he says she shouldn’t settle until dad agrees to give up his prius in the settlement. then, he told her this was the most interesting case he’s had since the sexual harassment lawsuits over ten years ago. i guess dad’s mistress from _ashley madison_ was also some kind of fetish sex-worker from the deep web, or something.”

craig frowns. “how do you know about the deep web?”

ruby snickers. “where do you think i got all of my guns from?”

“you don’t have guns,” craig says matter-of-factly. “just take the bus to school, like i do.”

ruby glares at him. “i’m not taking the bus! shelley marsh dropped out of college and her first time doing our route is today, and i’m too young and pretty to die!”

“shelley marsh is a bus driver now?” craig asks, wrinkling his nose. “what happened to our old driver?”

“she’s suing the school for maltreatment. i guess eric cartman found out she was an anti-vaxxer and conspiracy theorist and he convinced her that he was vaccinated and if his bodily fluids ever touched her, she would spontaneously combust. then, he sneezed on her, and she drove the bus into _skeeter’s_ bar. gerald broflovski is representing her too, but he says if suing the school over eric cartman’s behavior was feasible that he would have done it himself twenty times by now.”

“fine,” craig grumbles, “just no more talking.”

“one more thing,” ruby says, flashing her teeth wolfishly, “kenny is across the street wagging his dick at you.”

craig pulls the blackout curtains more tightly together, without chancing a look himself. “jesus, ruby,” he berates, “don’t _look_!”

“why? are you afraid kenny was actually trying to impress _me_?”

craig scoffs. “shut up, loser. if it takes you more than ten minutes to get ready, i’m leaving without you.”

it takes her nearly an hour to get ready and craig is loathe to admit that he falls asleep sitting upright in their living room chair while he waits for her to get ready. when he wakes up, he has a crick in his neck and a desire to strangle every squirrel that darts out in front of them on the road for making him slow down and get to school even later.

“why were you late?” clyde asks, his arms folded over his chest. ever since craig’s parents split up, clyde has been trying to parent him. being raised by a single father has done wonders for clyde’s desire to be a tough-love motivational speaker. if one day goes by without clyde lecturing him on his attitude, pessimism, and neurotic tendencies, it’s a day where clyde has gone without joy. with his transparent goggles on, though, which he’s using to protect his eyes, while he pauses from sawing away gracelessly at a block of wood, clyde manages to look about as threatening as one of the squirrels craig nearly plowed down on the way to school.

token looks back and forth between clyde’s block of wood and his own. “what are you making?” he asks.

clyde shrugs. “i don’t know. a smaller block of wood?”

“so, craig’s late again this month?” kenny says from across the table, standing opposite clyde and token, “funny -  bridon gueermo’s little sister told me that after she greased my monkey.”

craig makes a face of disgust, though he knows kenny is just kidding. he moves to tug his apron over his head, feeling swamped by the material, though he’s plenty tall enough to wear it, though wearing it _well_ was enough thing.

kenny is easily the only guy in their class who manages to make protective goggles and stained aprons look good. everyone else looks like they watched too much _bill nye the science guy_ growing up and stole their mother’s apron she uses to bake cookies with. craig thinks it’s because the guys in his class have ironed aprons, which they take home to have their mothers wash for them. kenny’s apron is stained so badly that it’s original red hue is more of a washed-out pink and the neckline is fraying and droops down to reveal his collarbones. kenny has never bothered to wash his, either because his family doesn’t own a washing machine anymore, or because their’s might be broken.

craig had gotten sick of looking at how dirty kenny’s apron was one day after kenny had tried shaking off the wood clippings from his apron like a dog, so he’d offered to take kenny’s apron home and wash it for him. craig never should have mentioned his building’s private laundry facility - it was his safe haven. if the laundry room was a person - so steadfast, dependable, and boring, craig would have married it by now. however, kenny had never met a restricted area he didn’t like and subsequently invite himself into. thus, his laundry room had begun an extra-marital affair with south park’s very own white trash james dean.

kenny is also the first one to put his goggles on at the start of every class and has never complained like clyde that it would mess up his hair. craig thinks kenny’s paranoia might stem from the fact that he lives in a dilapidated wooden shack that his father and gerald broflovski built as teenagers that continued to fall apart more each year, which kenny must associate with the rundown shop classroom. kenny had claimed a wooden beam in their ceiling had fallen and nearly decapitated him once, but craig assumes he’s exaggerating. regardless, he’s the most paranoid guy in their class by a long-shot. the first day they’d had this class, mr. adler had turned on a chainsaw and kenny had jumped high enough to clear a mailbox had one been beneath him.

it had actually been, dare he even say, _cute_ to see kenny lose his smarmy exterior and display vulnerability for once. kenny wouldn’t even pick up any of the tools they’d been given until craig had checked, double-checked, and triple-checked that kenny was out of range should any of the tools magically fly out of craig’s hand and pierce kenny in the heart. ever since then, craig has been waiting for kenny to need him to do another safety check, but it’s never come. it’s been one of craig’s major disappointments this year. it was always weird for him to realize that, despite the fact that he hated being social, he longed to be needed sometimes in the worst way.

clyde actually snickers at kenny’s joke, which is one of the many reasons clyde isn’t to be trusted on matters of any substantial emotional duress. token cringes like kenny’s humor is intruding on his well to-do dinner party, rather than fit for the situation, since making casual sex jokes in a room full of hormonal teenage boys is the norm.

craig has always wondered what token has seen in clyde. token is well-mannered, clean-cut, and rich enough to pay clyde a wall street stockbroker’s salary to clean his room, which he did once in the fourth grade, but never did again, because clyde actually made token’s room _messier_ by emptying the vacuum bag out on token’s carpet by accident. craig knows that token likes hanging out with him because craig has never given him shit about token having the perfect family, because craig more or less had one too before the divorce. craig can’t understand why token doesn’t mind when clyde whines about his dead mom every time the three of them get drunk in token’s indoor bowling alley. as far as craig’s ever been able to tell, token and clyde’s relationship would be defunct if not for craig holding them together like glue, since clyde's crush was seemingly unreturned. 

“what the fuck, dude?” clyde asks token, looking at token’s immaculately sanded-down bust of a man. “how’d you do that?”

token shrugs. “it was easy. do you want mine? i’ll make another.”

“any of you got any wood i can have?” craig asks, looking around their table.

kenny beams as if craig had just informed kenny that he’d won the lottery. “for _you_? you _know_ i’ve got wood. you need a good screw to go with that?”

craig flips him off and stalks off. he walks over to mr. adler’s desk, where the man is playing solitaire on his computer and looking far less suicidal than usual, which might grant craig a little luck. “mr. adler, i need some wood,” craig says listlessly.

“there’s no more,” mr. adler replies, his eyes glazing over into the abyss. you know how _that_ one goes. you stare long enough into the abyss, the abyss throws your back out when you’re only twenty-five and causes you to fork over your construction company and become a woodshop teacher until the day you die. nietzsche. “you should have gotten here earlier.”

craig grits his teeth. “my mom was on the phone with the divorce attorney, so i had to drive my sister to school.”

“not my problem,” mr. adler says, moving his eyes elsewhere. craig flips him off. “hey!” he barks, sounding offended. “i saw that!”

craig shakes his head as he walks back to his shithead friends. _no shit, you saw that,_ craig thinks, _i wanted you to._ he walks away briskly because if he gives mr. adler any time to reflect, he’d probably wind up with another week’s worth of detention. he had a full week’s detention last month when some freshmen on the football team had made a dig at token for kneeling before the game to protest the anthem and craig had stuck his foot out on impulse, tripped the kid, and caused the kid’s nose to start gushing blood after it had made impact with the ground. he hasn’t been in a fist fight in years, but he’s hardly turned into a pacifist. he’s just usually out of shits to give, but his fists almost came out of retirement that day, between that kid’s big mouth, and what he saw when he learned who would be in detention with him all week. craig had waltzed in and threw his backpack onto the desk, not caring who he woke up from their naps. there were a few kids who were always in detention too - kids younger than craig who he couldn’t identify if he tried, but he liked it that way. they slept through detention, while craig tended to sneak his earphones up under his shirt and listen to music to pass the time.

the guy beside him had his arms wrapped around his balled-up brown leather jacket and his face mashed into it. at the sound of craig’s bag slamming onto the desk beside his, the guy had looked up. _of course_ , craig had thought. that kid was always coming up with stupid schemes that were dangerous and threatened his life half the time. he’s lucky to be in detention with craig and not in jail or in a ditch somewhere. every time craig has seen him orchestrating a scheme that’s destined to fail, or even partaking in one of cartman’s, he would get the urge to ask him, _you live like this?_

_“oh, hey, dude.”_ stan had smiled jovially, as if he and craig were good friends _. “i’m glad you’re here. i thought i wasn’t gonna have anybody to talk to.”_ craig had glared, his silence causing stan to continue trying to fill the tension with nervous babbling. _“i’m missing a study date with wendy to be here. she’s gonna be pissed at me when she realizes i’m not coming.”_

craig had just rolled his eyes. wendy probably broke up with stan every two weeks because stan blew her off for something stupid - whether it be to help kyle foil one of cartman’s plans or to hang out with the goth kids behind the school. craig had a sneaking suspicion that stan went back there every couple of days to feed them sad poetry about love that the goth kids would assume was about wendy, but was probably about kyle. he hadn’t asked stan why he still hung around the goth kids, though, because he hadn’t given a shit.

when craig gets back to his table, he sees that kenny is catching craig’s friends up with their oujia experience. clyde looks like a kicked puppy. he has the unfortunate trait of getting insulted when he’s not invited to things he would have zero interest in going to. for instance, clyde is terrified of horror movies and hates anything spooky, and would have turned down the invite had one been extended to him. however, he clearly wanted to be asked just so he could have said no.

“you wouldn’t have gone, anyway,” token says, reading craig’s mind. he turns to kenny. “why’d you invite cartman?”

kenny’s grip on the hacksaw he’s brandishing seems to go tighter. “i thought he would pay for the booze. did you know that fucking asshole is still getting royalties off that _faith + 1_ record? he told me he made five grand last month off those. the denver christian stations still play those songs.”

token nods. “yeah, my parents have been making me put that money into my trust fund. i can’t touch it until i’m eighteen. i doubt butters has seen a dime of it. his dad probably blew it all on strippers.”

kenny puts the hacksaw down, but leaves his protective goggles on. “nah, he’s in full control of that money.” token and clyde look at him questioningly. craig would too, if only he gave a shit. well, maybe he’s a little curious if kenny helped butters, considering their sexual history. even in craig’s head, thinking about _butters_ having a sexual history makes him queasy. kenny doesn’t try to explain how butters could have managed outwitting his father, or gotten his hands on the money while he’s still underage, and the awkward lull in conversation goes unnoticed by clyde, who has already latched onto another topic.

“so, why were you guys using a oujia board?”

craig leans forward and rests his forearms on the table, blowing out a harsh breath, due to stress. “turns out i’m being haunted by a dead mad scientist.”

“actually, he’s not dead!” kenny exclaims happily. “i thought we could go visit him after school.”

_“he’s not dead?”_ craig grits out, raising his voice. he sees token’s eyebrows raise out of the corner of his eyes. he and clyde aren’t used to seeing craig express many emotions, other than listlessness, apathy, and an occasional stoic snort of laughter. “he was, like, a hundred goddamn years old when were ten - how’s he still _alive?_ that prick tried to destroy our entire town and he got to walk away unscathed?”

kenny winces, but leans in closer to craig and lowers his voice. his eyes are still bright with excitement and craig is hard-pressed to want to take that away from him. “i know, but that was the only lead we got, so we’ve got to use it. he doesn’t even experiment on animals anymore - trust me. he’s not living out in the boonies on that hill, either. he lives in some apartment complex in town. turns out that mr. kim had his address. he had chinese delivered on new year’s last year.”

craig looks at kenny blankly. “ _my_ apartment complex, mccormick. it’s the only one in town.”

kenny’s expression falters. “oh, shit.”

clyde looks back and forth between the two with confusion. “who are we talking about?”

“mephesto,” kenny replies, looking at them hopefully.

“that idiot who genetically altered donkeys into having multiple asses?” token asks, finally putting down his wood. “i thought he was dead.” he doesn’t seem to notice craig glaring at him. “that guy is seriously dangerous. don’t go anywhere near him.”

“well, how else do we figure out who’s haunting craig if it’s not mephesto?” kenny asks. “that’s the only name the oujia board gave.”

clyde’s eyes light up. “bug the place! set up cameras _paranormal activity_ style.”

“i don’t have the money to be setting up surveillance cameras,” craig says, scratching the back of his neck. “this could be settled so much more easily if you could just punch ghosts.” kenny pulls his cell phone out of his pocket and starts typing away. craig wonders if he’s trying to find out if there are any cheap surveillance cameras on _ebay_. without any wood to work with, craig watches token take clyde’s block of wood and begin carving it a circular shape.

“it’s gonna be a basketball,” token says, handing the circular wooden chunk back to clyde. “get some orange paint. i’ll ask wendy to make you a miniature jersey in _home ec_ tomorrow and you can present it to mr. adler for the biographical woodworking project.”

“wow, dude!” clyde exclaims gratefully. “you’re the shit!”

“oh, here’s something. did you know that over two-hundred thousand surveillance cameras are bought by americans each year?” kenny asks suddenly, sounding shocked, “and can you _believe_ that only fifteen thousand of those are the cameras i hid in craig’s bedroom last week?”

craig lowers his head to hide his blush. if it hadn’t been for kenny’s voyeurism that morning, watching craig without him knowing, that comment wouldn’t have the back of his neck going hot. clyde busts into loud laughter just as mr. adler makes his way over to their table. “don’t screw around!” he bellows before walking to the next table, where jimmy has partnered with jason to create a large microphone made of wood.

kenny leans in close to craig again and gently nudges craig’s side with his elbow. “think about it, tucker.”

craig looks up at him, _this_ close to touching noses with kenny, and grimaces. “think about you having bugged my bedroom to watch me undress?”

kenny’s mouth twists into a saccharinely sweet smile. “i _meant_ to think about coming with me to see mephesto later, but hey, if that works for you….” he looks down at his wrist, which is bare. “i’m free at about.... literally anytime-o’clock.” he flashes another smile. “i’ll buy the cameras, you buy the lingerie.”

token makes a gagging sound and excuses himself to the back of the classroom to sharpen a pencil he doesn’t even need for the class, while clyde looks stricken with disgust, but hasn’t moved one inch, because that would mean he would miss out on something. if marsh’s biggest fear was his sister’s fists, then clyde’s biggest fear was not being present for something that would later be a story told without himself being featured in it.

craig rolls his eyes. “i’ll think about it.”

* * *

craig uses his free period to wander around the empty halls with his mind running through his options in a haze until he reaches a chair pushed up against a wall, beside a room with it’s door shut. he collapses into it, hoping whatever teacher inside won’t see him and ask for a hall pass. after a few minutes of uninterrupted silence, someone pokes their head out from behind the door and sighs heavily. “well, come on in, m’kay.”

craig looks up, his eyebrows furrowing. mr. mackey is looking at him expectantly and holding the door open for him. craig’s eyes roam over to the door, which reads _counselor_ in huge capitalized letters. he looks in confusion down at his seat. he came to a familiar place in the midst of his internal meltdown.

“craig? do we have an appointment?” mr. mackey asks, sounding impatient.

craig doesn’t bother looking up again. “no. just habit.”

mackey eyes him suspiciously, then shuts the door.

* * *

“ah, you boys must be here for the spiritual cleanse. did you bring beverages with electrolytes? i have some here for a small fee.” mephesto hasn’t aged well since craig last saw him. his skin is leathered and puckered and would probably feel like sandpaper to the touch. his hair had been gray, if craig remembers correctly, but now he seems to be completely bald from under his yellow hat, judging by the shininess of his upper forehead. craig disregards mephesto’s loaded statement and pushes past him to get into his apartment. he’s not interested in digging through mephesto’s disturbing philosophies, especially if it means he has to be in the same room as the guy for longer than five minutes.

mephesto looks surprised, but nods towards kenny and gestures for him to come inside. craig looks around the apartment. it has the same exact layout as his, only backwards, since it’s on the other end of the building. “you didn’t bring sleeping bags either?” he asks in confusion. “you’re not very prepared, _are_ you?”

kenny shoots craig a look like he’s just had sour milk, probably because he, like craig, is imagining having a sleepover with someone as unsettling to be around as mephesto. “we’re actually here to find something out about my friend here.”

mephesto glances back to craig appraisingly and shrugs. his watery eyes pierce through craig and make him uncomfortable enough to shuffle closer to kenny. mephesto looks back to kenny. “yes, i could give him another ass for you, but only if you signed a non-disclosure agreement. i’m not technically in practice anymore.”

craig growls and lunges toward mephesto. “are you fucking insane?” he shouts, his body struggling to release itself from the grip kenny has gotten on him. “after _everything_ , you’re _still_ experimenting on people?”

mephesto’s eyes go wide as he watches craig struggle to break free from kenny. “no, no! people ask all the time, you see. it’s a very arousing idea for couples who have lost interest in each other sexually. fewer people ask now that _ashley madison_ went offline, but they’ve always gotten spooked by the paperwork and left!”

craig huffs angrily, but lets his tense muscles relax, though kenny leaves his hands on either side of him, probably for safe measure. “we’re here because i’m being haunted!”

“oh?” mephesto asks. “yes, of course. why didn’t you just say so?” mephesto begins to walk towards his sofa, where he promptly sits, looking like he wants to put as much distance between himself and craig as possible. craig has no issue with this, as he’s still seething. “well, this area is ripe for ghost activity. there’s a dense history of traumatic death here.”

kenny frowns. “but these apartments were just built, like, a month ago. how is there any history to begin with?”

craig clucks his tongue and leans closer to kenny. “this guy is a fucking lunatic. let’s get out of here,” he suggests under his breath.

“this plot of land was actually an indian burial ground - in fact, some local boy was said to have been dug up from his grave and reburied here, and was reborn as something not entirely human!”

kenny snorts from behind craig, finally letting his hands loosen from craig’s shoulders. “yeah, that’s a rumor that was started about my friend butters. it was basically a prank on his parents.”

mephesto nods carefully, looking deep in thought. “yes, of course. even so, this plot of land was, in fact, an indian burial ground. there was even a pet store here once called _the indian burial ground pet store_.”

“so, my friend’s ghost is either a pissed-off native american, or it’s some little ghost kitty reenacting _pet sematary_?” kenny asks, jerking his thumb in craig’s direction with a slight smirk on his face that will probably go undetected by mephesto, who seems to be taking this as serious as a heart attack.

mephesto’s expression goes dark. “well, it certainly could be either of those things, but more importantly, the life force behind the pain and suffering of these unrestful spirits has a magnetic effect on the otherworldly dimension. it can open a door between one world and the next.”

“when you say another _world-_ ” kenny starts.

mephesto shrugs. “any world - even hell itself. ghosts are one thing - demons are another.”

craig scoffs and turns to kenny. “are you hearing this crap?” when he looks at kenny, his breath gets caught in his throat. kenny looks panic-stricken. his eyes are glazed-over and he’s staring straight ahead - at nothing. it looks like he’s seeing something terrifying, though, because his mouth is agape and his eyebrows begin to twitch. craig reaches for kenny’s arms and shakes him slightly. “mccormick, snap out of it,” he says firmly. kenny’s eyes look straight through craig, who has turned to face kenny on the sofa, his knees brushing up against kenny’s. craig is in kenny’s direct line of vision, but it’s like he’s somewhere else, his mind totally asleep at the wheel.

mephesto stands and walks over to kenny slowly, leaning down and putting one hand on either side of kenny’s face. “how interesting,” mephesto says, “would you mind if i ran a few tests on him?”

this time, there’s nobody to stop craig as he lunges at mephesto. his hands land squarely on mephesto’s chest and he topples down, taking mephesto with him. he thinks mephesto might have banged his head on the edge of the coffee table, but he isn’t sure. his fist has connected with the fatty skin at mephesto’s side, making the older man huff in pain. craig doesn’t even hear any movement behind him between the shrilly ringing in his ears due to his rage and mephesto’s grunts of pain, but he feels kenny’s hands yanking him upright.

“tucker, for fuck’s sake! my scrawny ass can’t lift you if you’re still swinging!” kenny cries, pinning craig’s arms to his sides so he stops trying to land jabs to mephesto’s sides.

craig finally stops swinging and shakes his shoulders to get kenny’s hands off him. “i’m ready to go.”

after they’re on the other side of mephesto’s door, leaving mephesto panting and glaring at craig from the floor, craig heaves as he tries to catch his breath. kenny reaches over and claps craig’s back heartily. “you okay up there, tucker? do you need me to reach up there and give you mouth-to-mouth?”

craig slumps back against mephesto’s door, ignoring kenny. “shit, that guy is a fucking psychopath. what happened to you back there?”

kenny’s entire body language shifts, his mouth pressing into a firm line and his back going stiff as a board. “nothing. look - we broke one of the rules of using the oujia board. you’re not supposed to use a oujia in a place where there’s been a violent history.”

“who cares?” craig asks and steps closer to kenny. “you don’t really buy any of that shit about _demons_ , do you?”

kenny looks up at craig and swallows roughly. “no, i’m not fucking retarded.” he schools his expression into an admittedly decent-looking grin that craig doesn’t actually believe is genuine. “remember when those herbalists came to town when we were kids? maybe if it’s a native american haunting you, we could barter some cherokee hair tampons for your safety.”

craig snorts. “look, we need to try the oujia again. mephesto didn’t give us fucking anything.”

“we’re not doing that.” kenny reaches forward and puts one hand on craig’s chest and pushes him back against the door, like he thinks craig is going to run off to do just that. “ _you’re_ not doing that. we’ll just - have to figure something else out.”  

* * *

this was _so_ against craig’s entire character. craig has never been much of a risk-taker - his mother told him that when they were teaching craig to ride a bike, craig liked the feeling of being protected by his knee pads and elbow pads so much that he’d started wearing them to school. he doesn’t remember, but it sure as hell sounds like something he’d do.

he’d briefly considered asking ruby to join him, but the thought of her rolling around the floor in hysterics when the ghost called craig a virgin again was plenty reason not to. he set up the candles, the oujia board, and the planchette on his bedroom floor. sitting cross-legged in front of the board, with his bedroom door closed, craig just hopes his ghost doesn’t blow the door open and alert his family to the fact that craig is trying to converse with something from beyond the grave. it wasn’t the first time this week or even today that craig wished he lived somewhere else - away from his mother who was never around to give him advice and his sister had no use for him and would likely never need him to do the things every brother was meant to do for their sister. ruby was so brave and self-reliant that she’d probably one day warn her _own_ prom date to treat her well.

was it _such_ a crime to need to be needed every once in a while? was every single person in his life too prideful to ask him for help? god _knows_ his mother needed it. kenny probably would like to stay over at craig’s, away from his own crazy parents, more often. craig knows, despite this, that kenny will never ask. some weird, morbid little part of him fantasizes sometimes about kenny sneaking through his window in the middle of the night crying and needing craig to reassure him that kenny will never end up like his parents. it won’t ever happen - craig will just have to stick with caretaking for stripe, the only living creature that depends on craig for anything.

moving the planchette to _hello_ , craig sighs deeply. he feels incredibly stupid for doing this alone. although craig has seen plenty of crazy shit having grown up in south park, his stance on ghosts has always been that they were merely a way for lonely people to pretend their dead relatives were still around. craig gets lonely too, but that’s what stripe is for. he hasn’t ever needed to stoop to such ridiculous levels of lunacy before now to feel companionship.

“hello?” craig says quietly, knowing ruby won’t be able to hear him over the sound of the pop music she’s blaring through her speakers in the next room. he’s too embarrassed by his own trembling voice to raise it and attempt to sound more assertive. “is anybody here with me?” when nothing happens, craig clears his throat nervously. “am i alone in this room?”

it takes several long, profoundly, and wonderfully boring seconds where nothing happens. then, the planchette skirts out from under craig’s hand and moves along the board without craig touching it at all. if craig were less of a sensible person, he would almost be willing to say that it appeared another hand, albeit invisible, had taken hold of the planchette, which rests now on the word _no_.

craig inhales sharply and looks around his bedroom. nothing else has moved - not even his door has budged. “who else is here, then?”

the planchette darts just as suddenly over to the alphabet, stopping on the letter _s_. moving one letter to the right, it stops yet again on _t_. craig frowns. would it spell out steven maybe? did he know any stevens who were dead? butters’ dad was named steven, but to his knowledge, the guy isn’t dead. the planchette moves backwards two letters to the _r_. then, it moves to the _i_ , the _p_ , and finally comes to a sudden halt on the letter _e._

“ _stripe_ ,” craig says flatly, looking up to where stripe’s cage lay on his desk. “ _stripe_ is here with me. you must think you’re really funny.” the planchette flew up to the left corner of the board over the word _yes_. craig sat very still, glaring at the board. “i wish mccormick had decided to help - i’m sure he would have appreciated your astute sense of humor.”

the planchette whipped clean across the top of the board to the word _no_.

“no?” craig asks, horrified. “why not?”

craig watches as the planchette quivers slightly, but doesn’t leave the word _no_. it’s almost as though whatever has taken hold of it is at a loss for words and can’t decide what to say. craig watches as the planchette painstakingly-slowly spells out the word _‘need’_.

“need what?” craig asks.

_‘soul’_ , the planchette decides to spell.

craig leans backwards in horror, not wanting to be sitting this close to the board any longer. “this is ridiculous,” he says, shaking his head. “you’re probably not even the one we spoke to last time.”

the planchette slides upwards and lands on the word _yes_.

“there’s no way you could even prove it,” craig says. “if this place really once _was_ an indian burial ground, there’s no telling how many spirits could theoretically still be here.”

the planchette begins moving again. craig waits with a sickening sense that he’s not going to like where this is going.

_‘virgin’_ , the planchette says.

craig laughs dryly. it _would_ fucking figure that the first person to need craig for anything in the past year would be a fucking ghost. he’s always wanted to be needed, to prove his worth to someone, and now he can - by giving his soul to some otherworldly piece of shit ghost who likes to mock him. craig is beyond frustrated at this point. he’s at his max capacity for insanity, even after how short a conversation it’s been. kenny was right - he should never have done this alone. without bothering to say goodbye to such a resentful creep of a ghost, craig folds his board back up, blows out his candles, and sticks the oujia board back under his bed where it belongs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the extreme delay! with the fractured but whole game's release, i had never expected to see mephesto, since we haven't seen him in what felt like centuries. i decided i liked the idea of him being alive, but it forced me to change the entire first arc of this story. i also won't be updating tags and pairings until they emerge, as to not spoil anything.

**Author's Note:**

> virgotrixie.tumblr.com


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